Events
Join us on Wednesday, March 4th for an Artist Demo with Mark Zieff. Mark was recently awarded the Baldwin Prize for Drawing for his artwork featured in Concord Art’s juried exhibition, Members Juried 2: Collage, Crafts, Drawing, Graphics, Mixed Media, Photography, Printmaking 2025.
Image: Mark Zieff, On My Time, colored pencil on Canson paper, 25” x 19”, 2025. Winner Nancy T. Baldwin Prize for Drawing.
I create artistically realistic, still life drawings composed of commonplace man-made objects arranged to form a narrative.
I’ve always been interested in older, everyday household objects – the well-used, worn and imperfect. I use my artwork to look for meaning in the physical world through the things people interact with. As artifacts of human activity, objects hold symbolic meaning connected to history, culture, beliefs and the human experience. When placed within a context of a still life composition, the objects can take on a more complex meaning that allows me to examine a wide variety of emotions and ideas.
I strive for intimacy through detail and simplicity of materials, color and composition. I love working with charcoal, colored pencils and simple watercolor washes. Each of my still life’s consist of a focal object and secondary, supporting objects that help clarify and strengthen an emerging story. The final composition is traditionally lit to reveal form and character and rendered with charcoal and colored pencils on toned paper. The paper sets the middle tone and unifies the piece while the pencils help me achieve great detail as well add structure, tone, volume and richness to the drawing.